Played for both: Nine fab or flop forwards for Spurs and West Ham

West Ham United have ambitions to be in Europe, and London rivals Tottenham can consider themselves regulars in continental competitions. This classic case of haves and have-nots is just one subplot ahead of Sunday lunchtime’s Premier League clash between these two.

Coral make the Hammers 7/2 outsiders to win at White Hart Lane, with manager Sam Allardyce’s future at the club in doubt after contract talks were reportedly halted following an FA Cup exit. It’s 11/4 for a draw.

Spurs, odds-on 8/11 favourites for victory here, saw their chairman Daniel Levy block Big Sam’s winter window deadline day 11th hour loan bid for striker Emmanuel Adebayor, who can’t get a game because of the fine form of Harry Kane.

West Ham, meanwhile, will be without target man Andy Carroll for the rest of this campaign after he had knee surgery on his medial ligaments. All this talk of attacking players got our football experts thinking; which fantastic forwards or flops have played for both these capital clubs?

We’ve done our research and found nine superb or shocking strikers from the Premier League era that got games at the Lane and across London at Upton Park. Read on to find out who they are:

Jermain Defoe
Deadly Defoe is now back in England with Sunderland, but the ex-England international started his career with the Hammers. Harry Redknapp sent him on loan to old club Bournemouth, and he burst onto the scene with scoring exploits.

When West Ham endured Premier League relegation in 2003 despite his best efforts, Defoe stayed loyal, but was snapped up by Spurs in January 2004. Aside from a calendar year with Portsmouth (2008-09), he spent nine years in north London before leaving for MLS franchise Toronto. Defoe is Tottenham’s record scorer in Europe, so our verdict on him is he was a hit!

Ilie Dumitrescu
Signed by Spurs off the back of a sensational match-winning display against Argentina at the 1994 World Cup, Romania forward Dumitrescu struggled to make an impact in England, but his cause was hardly helped by tabloid muck-raking.

Redknapp brought him to West Ham in 1996, but he failed to score at Upton Park. Dumitresu may have flopped in the Premier League, but still helped to shock the world on the grandest soccer stage in the USA. Relive Romania’s memorable last 16 victory over Argentina below:

Les Ferdinand
Current QPR director of football Ferdinand was also a popular figure at Tottenham (1997-2003) before transferring to the Hammers. He couldn’t help them stay up, however, and left when they went down.

As ‘Sir Les’ is most adored at Loftus Road and by Newcastle United’s Toon Army, it’s a shame his time in north and east London by Ferdinand’s high scoring standards were hampered by injuries.

Frederic Kanoute
Mali frontman Kanoute is best known for his seven seasons with Sevilla, where he won consecutive UEFA Cups and two Copa del Rey titles. Before reaching his pomp, however, he had encouraging spells with West Ham (2000-03) and Spurs (2003-05). He was a hit for us.

Robbie Keane
Republic of Ireland record scorer Keane recorded double figures in six consecutive seasons with Tottenham before briefly leaving for Liverpool.

During his second Spurs stint, he was loaned out to the Hammers, but failed to save them from relegation in 2011. That fact cannot detract from LA Galaxy star Keane being a hit, however.

Check out this tribute video:

Mido
Ex-Egypt striker Mido initially impressed on loan at Tottenham from Roma but, when he signed permanently, boy did he flop. It was a similar story later in his career when he failed to score during a temporary stint with West Ham.

Serhiy Rebrov
Having forged a prolific partnership for club and country with Andriy Shevchenko, Ukraine forward Rebrov was sold to Spurs by Dynamo Kiev for a reported £11m in 2000.

Like Mido, his first campaign was impressive, but then the wheels fell off and Glenn Hoddle loaned him to Fenerbahce. Rebrov spent the 2004/05 season at Upton Park, and netted just once during that Championship campaign.

Teddy Sheringham
Although Sheringham’s finest hour was scoring in stoppage time for Manchester United to help them beat Bayern Munich in the 1999 Champions League final, he netted two shy of 100 Premier League goals for Tottenham across two stints (1992-97 and 2001-03).

Young Harry Kane is similar in style to him, with the England call-up hopeful 7/2 to grab the opener on Sunday.

Some of the above names quit West Ham when they went down, but classy striker Sheringham signed for them in the Championship.

At the age of 39, Sheringham still could not stop scoring, hitting 20 as the Hammers reclaimed Premier League status with promotion via the play-offs. He’s as big a success as anybody mentioned here.

Sheringham, who is now attacking coach with West Ham, is ninth on the Premier League’s all-time top scorer list with 147 strikes. Enjoy some of these in this compilation below:

Bobby Zamora
He may have scored two play-off final winning goals, including one for West Ham, but Zamora never netted for Spurs in the Premier League. His better days were at Fulham, but he has a place in Hammers folklore regardless of his injury-prone tag and underrated target man status.